Court: High Court of Delhi
Bench: Hon’ble Justice Vibhu Bakhru and Hon’ble Justice Amit Mahajan
Case Title : Jayant Singh Raghav v. Vice Chairman, Delhi Development Authority & Ors.
Case No.: W.P.(C) 7642/2022
Date of Decision: 7 February 2025
Citation: 2025:DHC:906-DB
Background
DRI had earlier covered this matter when the Delhi High Court issued notice concerning accessibility in residential societies. The case arose from the efforts of Jayant Singh Raghav, a person with 100% visual impairment, to secure accessibility in Chandanwari Apartments, Dwarka, where he resides.
The case has now culminated in a judgment which holds that the statutory obligation under Section 45 of the Rights of Persons with Disabilities Act, 2016 (RPwD Act) to make existing public buildings accessible does not extend to an old private residential apartment complex.
While the judgment records the several accessibility improvements undertaken by the Society during the proceedings, its reasoning raises serious concerns from the perspective of the broader statutory scheme of the RPwD Act, the Harmonised Guidelines and Standards for Universal Accessibility in India – 2021 (HG-2021), Article 21 of the Constitution and India's obligations under the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD).
In our view, the judgment adopts an unduly narrow interpretation of the accessibility framework, particularly because Section 2(x) of the RPwD Act expressly includes “housing” within “public facilities and services”—a provision which does not appear to have been considered in the judgment.
The case before the Court
The petitioner had complained before the State Commissioner for Persons with Disabilities alleging violation of accessibility requirements in the residential complex.
The State Commissioner, by order dated 8 September 2021, directed the DDA to conduct an access audit of Chandanwari Apartments and required the Society to ensure accessibility in common areas and lift areas, including appropriate signage and tactile facilities.
The Society subsequently undertook several measures, including installation of tactile pavers, handrails and a reserved parking space. The petitioner, however, remained dissatisfied and continued to pursue the matter.
During the High Court proceedings, further accessibility measures were undertaken. These included installation of a talk-back system and braille markings in lifts, tactile pavers, ramps and other improvements. The DDA's inspection report recorded, among other things, installation of a ramp, braille markings and a floor announcement system in one of the lifts.
A meeting facilitated by the High Court in August 2024 identified as many as 38 issues relating to accessibility. These covered lifts, tactile pathways, ramps, handrails, signage, lighting, parking, accessible entrances, common facilities, the RWA office, parks, roads and other aspects of the residential environment.
The Delhi High Court's reasoning
The principal issue before the Court was whether the existing residential complex, constructed in the 1990s, was required to be retrofitted in accordance with the accessibility framework under the RPwD Act.
The petitioner relied, inter alia, on Section 45 of the RPwD Act and the Supreme Court's decision in Rajive Raturi v. Union of India, contending that the buildings were required to be made accessible.
The Court focused on Section 2(w) of the RPwD Act, which defines “public building” as a Government or private building used or accessed by the public at large.
It reasoned that entry into a residential apartment complex is restricted to bona fide residents and persons authorised by them, such as guests, visitors and domestic help. The Court therefore held that the residential buildings in question were not “public buildings” within the meaning of Section 2(w) and Rule 15(1)(a).
The Court consequently held that Section 45, which specifically refers to existing public buildings, did not apply to the residential complex. It observed that although accessibility improvements may be desirable, it was not mandatory to retrofit the existing residential buildings by virtue of Section 45.
The Court also held that buildings completed and occupied before the Unified Building Bye-Laws, 2016 came into force were not required to be modified or rebuilt in accordance with those later bye-laws.
But Section 2(x) expressly includes “housing”
This is the most significant concern with the judgment.
The Court's analysis focuses on whether the apartment complex is a “public building” under Section 2(w). However, Parliament has created a separate statutory category in Section 2(x): “public facilities and services.”
Section 2(x) expressly provides:
“public facilities and services” includes all forms of delivery of services to the public at large, including housing, educational and vocational trainings, employment and career advancement, shopping or marketing, religious, cultural, leisure or recreational, medical, health and rehabilitation, banking, finance and insurance, communication, postal and information, access to justice, public utilities, transportation.
The inclusion of housing is explicit.
It is therefore difficult to understand why the accessibility of residential housing should be determined solely by asking whether the building is a “public building” under Section 2(w), without separately considering the statutory recognition of housing as a public facility or service. This is not a distinction without substance.
“Public building” and “public facilities and services” are different statutory concepts
Section 2(w) defines a public building.
Section 2(x), separately, defines public facilities and services, expressly including housing.
The fact that a residential building may not satisfy the definition of a “public building” under Section 2(w) does not, by itself, answer the separate question of the applicability of the accessibility framework to housing as a public facility or service.
The Delhi HC judgment, however, appears to have treated the Section 2(w) analysis as effectively determinative of the issue.
In our view, this leaves a significant part of the statutory scheme unexamined.
The Harmonised Guidelines themselves expressly cover residential buildings
There is an additional and important reason why the issue cannot be reduced to the definition of “public building”.
The Harmonised Guidelines and Standards for Universal Accessibility in India – 2021 (HG-2021) expressly recognise residential buildings as a building typology.
The Guidelines' Table 6.1 includes under “Residential Buildings”:
- public housing including low-income housing;
- apartments;
- independent housing/builder floors;
- group housing;
- gated communities;
- old age homes;
- youth hostels;
- working women/men hostels;
- Dharamshalas;
- co-living spaces; and others.
In other words, apartments, group housing and gated communities—the very forms of housing with which the present case is concerned—are expressly contemplated by the national accessibility guidelines.
This is important because Rule 15(1)(a) of the RPwD Rules specifically refers to the standards for public buildings contained in HG-2021. The Department of Empowerment of Persons with Disabilities confirms that the HG-2021 was notified under Rule 15.
Table 6.2 goes considerably further
The significance of HG-2021 becomes even clearer in Table 6.2: “Minimum Accessibility Provisions in Different Building Occupancies”
For residential buildings, the Guidelines prescribe minimum accessibility provisions including:
a. Common and communal areas:
All common and communal areas—such as approaches, entrances/exits, lifts, stairs, lobbies, clubs, religious facilities, parking, sports facilities, parks and recreation areas, together with associated sanitary and other facilities—are required to meet accessibility requirements.
b. Accessible houses:
5% of houses must be accessible, preferably on the ground floor, supported by an appropriate allotment policy.
c. Universal design in the remaining houses:
The remaining 95% of houses are to incorporate minimum universal-design features, including minimum clear door widths at the main entrance, rooms, kitchen and at least one toilet/sanitary room, together with a bedroom.
d. Adaptable sanitary facilities:
The relevant toilet and sanitary room is to have access from the living/drawing room and comply with prescribed dimensions to enable occupants to adapt it to their needs, facilitating ageing-in-place and a disability-friendly environment.
e. Accessible recreational spaces:
Open spaces for play and recreation are to be accessible to children, elderly persons and others with special needs.
f. Adaptability of all housing:
Most significantly, all housing is to be designed and implemented with a concept of adaptability, so that spaces and elements can subsequently be retrofitted for adaptive functions according to the needs of persons with disabilities, elderly persons and persons with vulnerable health conditions.
These are not merely abstract principles. They specifically contemplate residential housing, common areas and future adaptation of housing for disability-related needs.
The significance of reading these provisions together
The statutory and regulatory framework therefore presents a much broader picture:
| Provision | Relevance |
|---|
| Section 2(w), RPwD Act | Defines “public building” |
| Section 2(x), RPwD Act | Defines “public facilities and services” and expressly includes housing |
| Section 40, RPwD Act | Provides for accessibility standards for the physical environment and other facilities and services |
| Section 44, RPwD Act | Requires accessibility compliance before building permission/completion certification |
| Section 45, RPwD Act | Deals specifically with accessibility of existing public buildings |
| Rule 15, RPwD Rules | Prescribes accessibility standards |
| HG-2021, Table 6.1 | Specifically identifies residential buildings including apartments, group housing and gated communities |
| HG-2021, Table 6.2 | Prescribes minimum accessibility provisions for residential buildings |
| HG-2021, Table 6.2(f) | Requires adaptability of all housing, including the possibility of future retrofitting |
This makes it problematic, in our view, to treat the absence of “public building” status as the end of the accessibility inquiry.
The accessibility framework itself expressly contemplates residential housing.
Section 45 is not the whole accessibility story
It is important to make one legal distinction clear.
The Delhi High Court may be correct that the specific language of Section 45, which refers to “existing public buildings”, does not automatically impose a five-year retrofit mandate on every old private residential building.
But that does not necessarily mean that private residential housing falls outside the accessibility framework of the RPwD Act altogether.
The broader question is what obligations arise from the Act's provisions concerning public facilities and services, accessibility standards, building permissions, service providers, reasonable accommodation, universal design and community life, read together with the applicable standards.
The judgment's conclusion that “it is not mandatory to retrofit the buildings” under Section 45 should therefore not be read as establishing a general proposition that accessibility is merely optional in private residential communities.
That would go much further than what Section 45 itself says.
Accessibility is fundamental to independent living
The deeper problem with a purely building-centric approach is that it overlooks the lived reality of disability. For a person with a disability, a home is not merely the four walls of an apartment.
The ability to live independently may depend upon being able to:
- reach the building entrance from the road or parking area;
- enter the building without encountering steps or other barriers;
- independently use the lift;
- move along common corridors and pathways;
- access parking;
- use community and recreational facilities;
- access religious or cultural facilities within the complex; and
- participate in the ordinary social life of the residential community.
An inaccessible route from parking to the lift can make an otherwise accessible apartment effectively inaccessible.
A lift without appropriate accessibility features can mean that a resident cannot independently reach their own home.
A barrier at the entrance to a community facility can prevent a resident from participating in the life of the very community in which they live.
The accessibility of the residential environment is therefore inseparable from the right to live independently.
Article 21: Accessible housing and the right to live with dignity
This also brings the issue squarely within the constitutional framework.
Article 21 protects not merely physical existence but a life of dignity, autonomy and meaningful participation.
For persons with disabilities, accessibility is a precondition for exercising those rights. The question is not simply whether a person has been provided with a physical dwelling. The question is whether they can enter it, leave it, move within it and participate in the surrounding community independently and with dignity.
The Supreme Court's jurisprudence under Article 21 has recognised the importance of the conditions necessary for meaningful life and mobility. The Allahabad High Court has now expressly applied this constitutional principle to residential community living.
Allahabad High Court: Accessibility in Residential Complexes is a Fundamental Right
The significance of the Delhi judgment is heightened by a subsequent decision of the Allahabad High Court in M/s SCC Builders Pvt. Ltd. v. State of U.P. & Others, WP(C) No. 5663 of 2026, decided on 26 February 2026.
DRI has separately reported this important judgment. DRI's coverage of the Allahabad High Court judgment.
The case concerned a homebuyer with 90% locomotor disability whose allotted parking space in a residential project had subsequently been divided, adversely affecting her convenient access to the lift.
The Allahabad High Court took a significantly broader approach. It held that the right to accessibility cannot be confined to public places and extends to structures involving community living.
The Court recognised accessibility to common facilities in residential buildings—including parking, lifts, pavements, playgrounds, community centres and gymnasiums—as a fundamental right of persons with disabilities under Article 21.
The Court also directed the authorities in Uttar Pradesh to incorporate accessibility requirements in housing projects and to ensure compliance at the stages of building permission and completion certification.
This is a significant constitutional development. It recognises a simple but fundamental proposition:
A person's home does not end at the front door of the apartment. The residential environment is an integral part of the person's home and community life.
The UNCRPD perspective
The narrow approach in the Delhi judgment is also difficult to reconcile with the UN Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (UNCRPD), which the RPwD Act was enacted to implement.
The long title of the RPwD Act expressly states that it is legislation enacted to give effect to the UNCRPD.
The Convention places accessibility, equality, dignity, autonomy, participation and independent living and inclusion in the community at the centre of the disability-rights framework.
Accessibility therefore cannot logically be limited to places that a person visits.
For a person with a disability, the ability to live in a home and participate in the community on an equal basis is at the heart of independent living.
A narrow interpretation under which accessibility protection substantially ends once a person crosses into a private residential community sits uneasily with this rights-based understanding.
The irony of the present case
There is also an important irony in the present case.
Although the Delhi High Court ultimately declined to issue further directions, the litigation itself resulted in substantial accessibility improvements.
The Society undertook measures relating to tactile pathways, braille buttons, talk-back systems, ramps, signage, lighting, parking, accessible entrances and other common facilities. The Court itself acknowledged that extensive efforts had been made by the Society to make modifications and improvements for the convenience of the petitioner. These improvements are welcome.
But accessibility in residential communities should not depend solely upon the goodwill of a housing society—or upon the ability and persistence of an individual person with disability to undertake prolonged litigation.
Accessibility should be understood as a right, supported by clear and enforceable standards.
DRI's View
The Delhi High Court judgment is important, but in our respectful view, its interpretation of the RPwD Act is unduly narrow and warrants reconsideration.
The Court's conclusion that Section 45's specific requirement concerning existing “public buildings” does not extend to an old private residential complex may follow from the language of Section 45.
However, the larger question of accessibility in residential housing cannot be answered merely by asking whether the building is a “public building” under Section 2(w).
Three aspects of the statutory and regulatory framework require attention.
First, Section 2(x) of the RPwD Act expressly includes housing within “public facilities and services”.
Second, the HG-2021 expressly covers apartments, group housing and gated communities and prescribes detailed minimum accessibility requirements for residential buildings—including accessible common areas, accessible housing units, universal-design features and adaptability for future retrofitting.
Third, accessibility is not merely a technical building requirement. For persons with disabilities, it is integral to dignity, autonomy, independent living and participation in community life, engaging Article 21 of the Constitution and the principles underlying the UNCRPD.
The subsequent Allahabad High Court judgment reinforces this rights-based approach by expressly recognising accessibility in residential community living as a fundamental right.
In our view, therefore, the Delhi judgment's failure to engage with Section 2(x), the residential provisions of HG-2021 and the constitutional dimension of accessible community living results in an interpretation that is difficult to reconcile with the object and spirit of the RPwD Act.
The larger question
The issue ultimately goes beyond the particular apartment complex in this case.
If Parliament has expressly included “housing” within “public facilities and services”, and the Government's own accessibility guidelines expressly cover apartments, group housing and gated communities, can residential accessibility be treated as merely optional because the building is not open to the public at large?
And, constitutionally:
Can the right to live independently and with dignity mean anything if a person with a disability cannot independently access the very environment in which they live?
For persons with disabilities, accessible housing is not a luxury or an additional amenity. It is a precondition for independent living.
The RPwD Act recognises housing within the framework of public facilities and services. HG-2021 recognises residential buildings and prescribes minimum accessibility and adaptability requirements. Article 21 protects life with dignity and autonomy. The UNCRPD recognises accessibility and independent living as central to equality and inclusion.
These principles should be read harmoniously—not placed in separate compartments.
The real test of an accessible India cannot merely be whether a person with a disability can enter a public building.
It must also be whether that person can get home—and live there independently, safely and with dignity.
That is why accessibility in residential societies is not merely a matter of building regulation.
It is a disability-rights issue, an independent-living issue, and a constitutional rights issue.
Read the Judgement
in Jayant Singh Raghav v. Vice Chairman, Delhi Development Authority & Ors.
W.P.(C) 7642/2022 dated 07 Feb 2025
